Crimpety Crimpety
by The juju was up inside my horn
Summary: Someone's stolen the crimp! Howard and Vince go on a mission to retrieve it. CRACK written in response to that Sugar Puffs ad.


**Disclaimer:** I own nothing and make no profit. All things Boosh belong to Julian Barratt and Noel Fielding.

**Summary:** Someone's stolen the crimp! Howard and Vince go on a mission to retrieve it. CRACK written in response to that Sugar Puffs ad.

**Crimpety Crimpety Fuck You!  
**

It was a crisp, cold winter night. The best sort of night for vest-and-pants antics, that. A satsuma fight to get the circulation going, then a good hard heavy sweaty passionate noisy bout of crimping til the early hours.

"Capybaras," Vince started, tentatively, but Howard didn't join in so he tried something else. "Marshmallow... um. Dishes." Still nothing. He looked at Howard, worried. "What's wrong?"

"I don't know." Howard was sitting there on the edge of his bed, hands in his lap, just staring at them, exuding confusion like a human skunk. "I'm just... not feeling it tonight, Vince."

"What? Why?" He couldn't make himself sound completely horrified, though. He felt the same. "You're always up for a bit of it."

"I'm not a lightbulb. I can't turn myself on and off when you feel like it."

"Come on, Howard, I know that." He shuffled forward and uncrossed his legs, sitting on the edge of his own bed so they were knee-to-knee. He went to take Howard's hand, then changed his mind and went to put his fingers under his chin instead and raise his head from its slump so he could see his eyes, but _then_ he remembered he wasn't allowed to touch and his hand kind of wandered around the air for a bit instead, looking lost and foolish. He dropped it back to the mattress with a soft little thump and tried a different tactic - Old Faithful, the unbeatable gimmick.

Vince made his eyes go very very big and said nothing.

After a minute, Howard glanced at him, and quickly away again. And back. And away, and back. He seemed to hover on the edge of some kind of mental precipice for a while, then sighed and let himself collapse over it.

(Vince smiled behind his hand, pretending to scratch his nose. _Always_ worked, the big blue eyes.)

"It's just... can't you feel it? There's something _wrong_ here, Vince. There's bad juju afoot."

"What kind of bad juju?" Vince leaned in and slid his hand up Howard's arm, clutching him tightly near the elbow. He didn't get yelled at. That scared him a bit. Howard must be really freaking out not to, well, freak out. He just sat there, looking somehow small, utter misery all over his face as obvious as if it had been stamped there by an over-zealous librarian.

"I think someone's stolen the crimp."

...

Two comforting cups of hot sweet tea later, and a gorilla-smack round the face for Howard, they'd just about stopped shaking enough to explain to Naboo why they'd woken him up by screaming hysterically and running around the bedroom like panicky trapped flies.

"Bollo thought noise was sexnoise," Bollo said, stroking Vince's hair back off his sweaty forehead and glaring at Howard as if to say _oh, you great Northern behemoth, this one's fragile._

"Yeah, well," Vince muttered, shaking the big hairy hand off and huddling into himself as much as a man can when he's wearing nothing except a vest, knee-socks and little blue pants, "Bollo's a bloody creep, then, innee?"

"Someone's _stolen_ the _crimp_," Naboo repeated. There was a hint of dubiousness in his voice. A bit more than a hint, really. Quite a lot. An _excess_ of dubiousness.

Howard nodded frantically, sloshing lukewarm tea over the rim of his cup and all over his bare thighs. "You have to help us!"

"How come I have to help you?"

"Because that's how it works!"

"...Oh yeah. Alright, then. Have you seen anybody weird lurking round the place recently? Let's start with that."

Vince piped up immediately with, "I saw that fishy freak here the night we had the bouncy castle party!" and Howard went all shifty and said Vince was a nincompoop and his flighty eyes couldn't be trusted and that he, Howard, had _exceptionally_ good eyes, although they were small, and surely would have noticed such a shameless blatant invader himself had one actually ever made it into the building. (Vince grinned to himself at Howard's blustering awkwardness, hiding the smile behind his cup, and decided he'd probe Howard later. Not like that. Although possibly like that, too.)

"This useless," Bollo grumbled. "For sake of moving plot on, we pretend Honey Monster has been sighted like big yellow Dalston yeti." Naboo nodded, and sent him to fetch transportation. Higher minds were needed.

...

The magic carpet skidded to a halt with a confusing screech of non-existent brakes. Howard promptly tumbled off, landing head-first on the leafy ground. Vince stepped down with a bit more grace, grimacing at the mud squelching under his long white socks, and offered Howard a hand that was completely ignored because apparently cold muddy half-naked Men of Action aren't allowed to accept help when they fall over. The hum of voices could be heard coming from somewhere nearby, although not quite the words being said until they made their way closer, rounded a corner, and stepped into the Board's clearing.

"Is it true, Kirk? _You're_ the father of Jamie Lynn's baby?"

"Yes."

"Naboo, you're late," Dennis said sternly, then seemed to deflate like a knackered balloon when he saw Howard and Vince and spent the rest of the scene trying to hide behind the bloke with the feathered hat (the bloke Vince's mate Kelly thinks has lovely pretty blowjob-lips) muttering vaguely obscene things about basic principles and the rethinking thereof.

It was a difficult thing to explain to the Board, this crimp-theft. How do you convey the urgency of such a thing when the people whose help you're trying to get don't have a clue what you're talking about? It's not like they could do a bit to demonstrate, THE CRIMP HAVING BEEN STOLEN and everything. "It's a bit like two-way scat with words," Howard tentatively started, then the others had to hold a snarling red-eyed Kirk back from ripping open Howard's jugular with his teeth.

"Oh, well done!" groaned the little pink tit with tentacles. "Go on, why don't you set him off again? We've just got him calmed down after _last_ time someone referenced the j-word. My friends and acquaintances, this is, unequivocally, an _outrage_."

The mêlée raged. Naboo turned his back on it, but nobody noticed and that made him sulky.

"Bollo has cousin," the gorilla suddenly said. "He tiny-brained retard. His friends also tiny-brained retards. Perhaps tiny brains not matter. They will die anyway. Perhaps they could help."

Howard still had his hands around his own throat in a sort of protective collar and he gave Bollo the dirtiest look he could manage. "Great, Bollo, thanks. You couldn't've told us this back at the shop?"

"Aw, Howard, leave it out, alright?" Vince was shivering in the cold night breeze, feeling even more petulant than normal and willing to go along with _any_ plan if it meant he'd get out of the mud. "It's not Bollo's fault. I think B just wanted to write the Shamans."

"So how come they're fighting like cocks and not coming with us?"

Vince shrugged. "Cos she discovered she was shit at writing them? I dunno." He turned to Bollo. "How can we get hold of your cousin, then?"

...

Back in the flat, far too many odd little people were squashed into a kitchen that was only used to seeing one - a strange little chap dressed like an astronaut, an oversized bee, a leprechaun, a racoon on a skateboard, three little men who appeared only to be able to speak that snapcracklepoppy African language of tongue-clicks (and whom Howard secretly believed to be involved in a nasty sordid little sexual threeway in their spare time), an anthropomorphic tiger in a really homosexual neckerchief, a terrifyingly large cockerel, an aging pervert with a balding head and a white labcoat, and what appeared to be their ringleader, Bollo's cousin Coco, a small brown monkey in a baseball cap who seemed to have the unique power of making everybody he met want to murder him. Howard had already tried putting _several_ moves on him, although these had all been foiled by Vince grabbing at him to keep him back and finding only small pants to hold, which for some reason made Howard go slightly funny on the inside and forget all thoughts of murder in favour of rainbows and bubbles and skipping through flowery meadows with some dark-haired little lady he didn't know yet but hoped he one day would, thoroughly and Biblically.

Coco rudely invaded Howard's daydream by clambering onto the table and banging a couple of saucepans together.

"ATTENTION!" he screeched, in an annoying high-pitched voice that made Howard's ears want to leave his body and take a gap year somewhere very far away. "Friends, my cousin Bollo-"

("Third cousin," Bollo corrected hurriedly, "several times removed.")

"-has called us here to help him in his quest to rid the world once and for all of the infamous thief known as the Honey Monster."

"HE STOLE MY LUCKY CHARMS!" the leprechaun howled. There was a great hullaballoo of noise, all the other weirdo little people and animals talking at once about the big yellow furry and its various heinous crimes. Vince shuffled as close to Howard as he thought he'd be allowed, shivering again and feeling rather in need of a big comforting cuddle. Somehow he felt worse, now, not better. This wasn't the way things were meant to be! He and Howard sorted out their messes on their own!

Howard leaned in close to whisper. "This isn't the way things are meant to be," he said, sounding miserable and kind of lost. "You and I sort out our messes on our own!"

He looked a bit confused when Vince BEAMED, but Vince couldn't help it, it was just reassuring to know that even when they were in the shit, when their crimp had been stolen and their kitchen overtaken by aggravating cartoon characters, even then they shared thoughts. One constant in this big stupid mess. It was something to hold on to. Something other than the pants, anyway - which, Vince suddenly realised, he was still clinging to from the last time Howard had tried to choke the monkey. (Not like that.) He almost let go, but didn't really want to so he, well, didn't.

"Let's just go, then," he said.

Howard raised his eyebrows, confused but kind of smiling, too. "Go where?"

"Away. Anywhere. Fuck 'em. It's just you and me, innit? We don't need anybody else, 'specially not _these_ little freaks." He plucked gently at the waistband of Howard's little pants, feeling suddenly shy. "I mean, I'll miss the crimping, but... I dunno, we'll just have to find something _else_ to do at nighttimes in our room when no one's looking... yeah?"

"Yeah," Howard said. He could feel Vince's fingers just inside the top of his pants. Somewhere in his head fireworks started going off in big gay colours like fuchsia and magenta. Like a slow-motion bad soap opera, he started to lean in for a kiss-

-unfortunately, Bollo chose that exact moment (trying to hurry along the 'plot' some more) to get himself a little late-night snack of cereal, and maybe he had some lingering magic on his hands from tidying up Naboo's stock cupboard earlier because something very strange happened when he touched the Sugar Puffs packet.

"SHIT, BOLLO, WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?" Naboo said, emoting with his customary vigour as his little form got swallowed up by the big black shadow of the monster erupting from the front of the cardboard box. All the little cartoons started freaking out, crowing and buzzing and clicking in fear, running and flying and skateboarding away as fast as they possibly could, except Coco who was an idiot and got crushed under the Honey Monster's massive yellow foot. (There was much rejoicing.)

"How d'you kill a Honey Monster?"

"Grab its balls?"

"Vince, that's a kangaroo!"

"Yeah, but grabbing _anything's_ balls is gonna slow it down, innit?"

But the monster didn't seem to want to have its balls grabbed, not even by Vince Noir, which Vince found incredibly hard to deal with as it was a good solid fact in his life that _everybody_ wanted him to touch their genitalia, as solid as up is up and water is wet. To have this fact casually nudged aside like a leftover crust of cold toast was unsettling, and that made him falter. The Honey Monster smiled its big furry vacant evil smile and grabbed Vince instead.

"DROP HIM AT ONCE, YOU... YOU... YOU BIG HAIRY UGLY MONSTER!"

The outburst felt like something of an anticlimax to Howard, who had been hoping for something much wittier and more commanding when he opened his mouth to let spew the rising flood of rage. The yellow monster just laughed boomingly and shook its big head, holding Vince by one muddy ankle and dangling him upside-down above his gaping mouth like a tasty oversized Haribo...

"Do something, Bollo!" Howard yelled, and Bollo scowled so furiously his glittering black eyes disappeared in folds of fur.

"Why? Because Bollo too is big hairy ugly monster?"

"Look, I apologised about that already."

"Hmph."

"Please, Bollo, I know you hate me but YOU LOVE VINCE and he's about to get eaten by a crimp-stealing furry!"

"Yeah!" Vince yelled, flailing around and spluttering through the hair hanging in his face. "How're you meant to write a song about _that_ kinda death? Do something! Anything! I can't die like this!"

"Grab his balls," Bollo ordered. "No, you idiot, not Vince's. Monster's."

"No, mine!"

Howard hesitated, hand outstretched. "What?"

"Um. I said, wine! Throw wine at it. Red wine stains like anything, 'specially on yellow fur." Nice cover-up, Vince thought, quite pleased with himself, and then his sparkly little braincell suddenly lit up like a billion torches and he screeched, "MILK! THROW MILK ON IT! HE'S A CEREAL-MONSTER!"

Howard lunged at the fridge and wrenched the door open, hoping hoping hoping they still had that four-pinter of beautiful creamy full-strength full-fat... but no, they had half a cardboard carton of skimmed, one day over its date.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Howard screamed, but salvation came in the shape of a big homosexual tiger.

"Stroke it!" the tiger said over its shoulder as it scarpered with the last of the cartoon cowards. "It's gets bigger if you stroke it! It's GRRRREAT!"

If this didn't prove his love, Howard thought, wanking off a carton of turned milk, then he'd just give it all up and settle for the merman.

It grew in his hands, though, swelling and bulging alarmingly until he could barely lift its throbbing weight. A white trickle dripped from the top down over his fingers.

"Vince!" he yelled. "Lean back! You don't want this all in your face and hair!"

Vince did a painful-looking backbend, wrenching his hair away from imminent danger, and Howard threw the massive carton of milk with a strength and aim he would never find again, directly into the Honey Monster's om-nom-nomming mouth. The beast roared, then made a funny glugging noise, then melted into a puddle of yellow gloop. Vince landed in it and shrieked hysterically because it was in his hair after all, and it was such a horrible piteous heartbreaking sound that Howard completely forgot he hated to be touched and threw himself at Vince for a bonecrushing comfort-hug.

"Erk," Vince said, after a minute. "Flnahg."

"What?"

He loosened his grip slightly, and Vince heaved in a massive desperate breath. "I said, ow."

"Oh. Sorry. Erm."

"Oh LOOK!" Vince said, excitedly interrupting Howard's awkward manly stammering. "It's the crimp!"

He plunged his hands into the lumpy goo and lifted the crimp out, cradling it tenderly in his arms and nuzzling it like it was a little teeny tiny pet fluffy kitten. Howard let his arms slip from round Vince's body and sat back slightly. Of course he was happy Vince was still alive, of course he was, but he was also three nanoseconds from giving himself a Chinese burn to soothe his INNER PAIN now they had the crimp back because surely Vince would take back that thing he said before about other things they might be doing alone at night in their bedroom, now.

"Hey," Vince said. He was smiling a little bit, all crooked and lopsided like he was nervous, which was funny because when was Vince Noir ever nervous? He put the crimp down beside them and took Howard's hands. They stopped itching to mutilate his arm at once.

"Hay's for horses."

"Permission to make a joke about riding you?"

Howard thought for a second. "Denied."

Vince's face fell, but his smile picked it back up when he realised Howard hadn't pulled his hands away yet.

Eventually, after a lot more awkwardness, and a very well-needed shower, they had blistering hot fluffy sex (Vince was on top, if you must know) - but that's another story for another time.

...


End file.
